Tesla’s Marketing Strategy: Don’t just make electric cars, sell a slice of the future.

They’re literally a better kind of car, according to both experts and regular drivers. As William Gibson would say, “The future is already here – it’s just not very evenly distributed.”

Tesla Motors has no advertising, no ad agency, no CMO, no dealer network. And that’s no problem. – AdvertisingAge

If you drop by the Tesla forums, you’ll see a community of passionate fans discussing how to market Tesla better. There are over 55,000 people subscribed to the /r/teslamotors subreddit. The brand has clearly struck a chord with its fans.

Tesla fans are crazy advocates. They attach deep emotional significance to the car. They’re not just paying for a mode of transportation, they’re paying for a slice of the future.

Despite all this, Elon Musk (the founder of Tesla Motors, aka Iron Man) conveys the impression that he isn’t too worried about marketing. Give Tesla an advertising budget, and they’d likely pour it into refining their production. The end result? An even more incredible car that everybody’s going to be talking about.

I know a lot of very wealthy people. Most of them made their money in technology. I don’t think Bentley or Rolls-Royce is anywhere near the top of very many of these people’s idea of an impressive car. A Tesla is more like it. – Jimmy Wales, on Quora

This sort of advertising is earned, not bought.

You have to ask – why are people interested in interviewing him? It’s because he’s working on cool, interesting projects. That’s all the marketing he needs. Do something truly cool and the media will beat a path to your door. [1]

Let’s dig into some examples of great Tesla PR / ‘free marketing’ in action:

1. A CEO who understands the power of showmanship (tonnes of interviews, cameos and media appearances)

“The public tends to be, as they should, interested in things that are precedent and superlatives.” – Elon Musk [source]

The above quote, I think, captures a lot of the essence of Elon Musk’s attitude towards marketing. He understands the utility of showmanship, of having a larger-than-life persona (hence doing things like movie cameos).

Elon Musk telling Tony Stark about his idea for an electric jet.

And if you ever Google “Elon Musk says” (with quotes), you’ll find a long list of very showy things that he’s said:

In a way, Elon Musk and Donald Trump have a lot in common – they both understand the power of saying something crazy.

The Hyperloop, which Elon Musk isn’t planning to make, but is great PR for him as a tech visionary. This is something much like Walt Disney, PT Barnum. He’s selling us a vision of a magical techno-wonderland.

5. New charger prototype is released, instantly gets parodied

The original submission to /r/videos on Reddit got over 15.5k upvotes.

Incidentally, the label “Ad?” is a perfect description of Tesla’s marketing tactics – so much of it is peripheral and focused on getting maximum word-of-mouth without literally being conventional advertising.

6. Tesla drivers make ‘Autopilot impressions’ videos

Autopilot impressions – when Tesla fans make videos of themselves using the Autopilot function. 33,800+ upvotes in the above instance.

What can a retailer learn from Tesla?

First, build something that matters to people.

This is the hardest thing to do, and it’s also at the deepest core of marketing. The best way to communicate value is to start by make something incredibly valuable to a significant market. The communication bit is relatively trivial if the value is self-evident.

In Elon Musk’s eyes, the “significant market” is humanity itself – electric cars are valuable because they’re the future of sustainable transportation. They’re also incredibly difficult to work on.

Then, tell a story that resonates with people.

Lots of people like to make comparisons between Elon Musk and Steve Jobs.

Steve Jobs was a master storyteller and he had a legendary flair for the dramatic. In comparison, Elon sometimes stumbles over his words awkwardly, but he has the measured confidence of a person who truly knows his stuff inside out.

You can’t fake that. A great story doesn’t necessarily need a polished storyteller – sometimes the story is best told haltingly, from the trenches.

But the point is, neither of them would be worth our attention if they were selling stuff that wasn’t valuable. iPhones (your music and the internet in your pocket!) are a great story. Electric cars are a great story. The greatest stories are aspirational, representing the triumph of passion, conviction, persistence and diligence.

Is there a flipside?

Anything successful and valuable has its fair share of haters. Cynics might say a Tesla is simply a glorified toy for rich technocrats to show off with. (Similar things have been said about Apple products.) That’s an entirely valid assessment of the situation, and a very happy problem to have if you’re a creator.

But humans are inescapably social creatures, and we’re pretty much always going to be obsessed with status symbols. We might as well make it something that genuinely puts our species on the path to sustainable transportation.

Our impulses and desires don’t change very much – but we can change the way we express them by changing the stories we tell ourselves.

More about Tesla:

[1] This is an oversimplification, of course, but it’s a starting point often overlooked by people looking to get a “quick break”. Paul Graham writes eloquently about the limitations of this perspective with Do Things That Don’t Scale.

Visakan Veerasamy

Visa is ReferralCandy's Blog Editor. He also co-founded Statement.sg, a fashion ecommerce label selling witty t-shirts. He's been thrice named a Top Writer on Quora. He hopes to enjoy a glass of whiskey onboard a commercial space flight someday.

It’s interesting to me, on hindsight, how adding the quote marks around “$0 Marketing Budget” instantly changed the tone of the whole piece. I prefer it. I think it’s important to be cautious and skeptical about these things when we’re discussing them.

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